Frequent sex keeps you young? Well, maybe not completely and not in all cases, but the one coincidence of being older and having more sex is definitely underrated. Scientists have found that regular sex helps delay the onset of menopause.
Menopause is the loss of cycle and fertility that occurs with age. This usually happens around the age of 55 or a little earlier. It’s true that some women go through menopause much earlier than others, and scientists think they’ve discovered one of the factors that can cause it.
The study included 2,936 women, most of whom were around 46 years old. The researchers wanted to find out about their sexual activity. The women had to reveal whether they had had sex in the past six months, what kind of sex they usually had, and how many times a week they usually had sex.
The majority of women (68%) answered that they lead a moderately active sex life and enjoy sex at least once a week.
At the start of the study, none of the women had yet entered menopause, but the study lasted 10 years, during which time 45% of the women in the study entered menopause.
Most women experience menopause around age 52. However, those who had regular sex experienced menopause much later. Women who had sex at least once a week were 29% less likely to go through menopause during the study period than those who only had sex once a month.
Meanwhile, those who enjoyed sex only once a month were 19% less likely to go through menopause during the study period than those whose sex lives were even less active.
Menopause is, of course, inevitable. However, regular sex can delay or at least prevent premature menopause.
And scientists have an explanation. Ovulation requires a lot of energy from a woman’s body. And when sex life becomes less intense, the body decides that spending energy on ovulation is simply not worth it – the chance of pregnancy is also very low.
At the same time, this confirms the so-called grandmother hypothesis. Menopause is believed to be a socio-biological evolutionary phenomenon that helps avoid competition between different generations. Older women, thanks to menopause, no longer spend energy on ovulation, pregnancy and childbirth, and this right is unwittingly passed on to younger generations of women, who are more likely to have healthy children. As a result, older women have more energy to devote to child care, such as taking care of their grandchildren. Since humans are social ‘creatures’, this may be one of the biological traits that helps us survive.